Dodgers crush Mets to complete road sweep

NEW YORK — After two intensely fought nail-biting victories, the Dodgers could use a laugher. Well, they got one on Sunday Night Baseball in front of a national audience. The Dodgers hitters’ jumped all over Mets starter Carlos Carrasco, slamming four early home runs in the first two innings. That was more than enough for ace Max Scherzer to work with. The Dodgers’ ace pitched around some traffic early, and the team coasted to an easy blow-out victory at Citi Field, beating the Mets by a score of 14-4.

Dodgers Offense Relentless

There were too many highlights in this game to list them all as the Dodgers collected 16 hits throughout the course of the game. They scored multiple runs in five of their nine at-bats, and basically buried every Mets pitcher that they saw for most of the night. The key to the game were innings one and two, where the Dodgers scored six times in what looked a lot like batting practice for the visitors. Starter Carlos Carrasco just didn’t have it tonight.

Dodgers hit two homers in the first

Still trying to work himself back into shape from a very long stint on the IL, Carrasco served up numerous tasty pitches in his 2.0 innings of work. In the first inning, there were two home runs. The first was by Justin Turner, a two-run shot to left center that scored Trea Turner. One batter later, catcher Will Smith hit yet another long fly, this one a solo shot to right that put the Dodgers up 3-0 before Scherzer had even thrown his first pitch. For Smith, it was the third straight game in which he’d blasted a home run, adding to his very strong second half of the year.

Three more runs in the second

In the second inning, more of the same. This time, it was Cody Bellinger who led off with a double, and came home to score a couple of hitters later when Trea Turner hit a double of his own. Max Muncy finished off Carrasco with a monster shot over the centerfield fence. The score was now 6-0 and the rout was on.

Scherzer works around defensive miscues

If there was one negative to this lopsided victory, it was the Dodgers’ defense, which didn’t look good at all in the field on Sunday. There were numerous miscues and bad decisions that led to Max Scherzer having to pitch under a lot more stress than necessary. Foremost in the defensive woes for the night was Trea Turner, who is still on a learning curve with playing second base. He botched a fairly easy turn on a double-play ball, and had a couple other adventures in the field, where outs were possible, but didn’t happen. Trea’s former Nats teammate Max Scherzer pitched around the self-imposed traffic for the most part, and only surrendered a couple of earned runs along the way. His final line for the night: 6.0 IP, 4 H 2 ER, 7 K.

Dodgers pile on in middle innings

Before Scherzer left the game, he contributed to his own cause in the top of the sixth, hitting a solid sac fly to center to score a Billy McKinney, who had reached on a one-out triple. After Trea Turner walked, Max Muncy mashed his second home run of the night, depositing a 2-0 changeup from reliever Yancy Diaz into the centerfield seats. With those three runs in the seventh, manager Dave Roberts pulled Scherzer and turned it over to the bullpen for the final nine outs of the ballgame.

Things get a little dicey in the seventh

As seems to be a pattern in these blowout wins, as soon as the Dodgers take their foot off the gas, the other team mounts a rally to make it interesting. This time, Mets hitters greeted new reliever Darien Nunez with a couple of walks and a single in the bottom of the seventh, and suddenly, the game took on a much more different hue than it had ten minutes earlier.

Nunez, who still is struggling to put together consistent outings, was lifted in favor of the often-erratic Edwin Uceta. Uceta threw a wild pitch to score a run, and gave up a loooooong fly ball to JD Davis that very nearly left the yard for a grand slam. Instead, it died on the warning track and the Mets had to be content with only one run on the play on the sacrifice fly. Luckily, Uceta got a strikeout on the next hitter and the Mets wouldn’t threaten the rest of the game.

Five more Dodger runs late in the game

With the game pretty much in hand, the Dodgers kept piling it on. With two outs in the eighth, Will Smith hit a two-run single with the bases loaded. It was followed up by a run-scoring double from Chris Taylor and whoa, Nelly, it was 12-4. The Dodgers got two more runs in garbage time in the ninth when Matt Beaty smashed a two-run shot off position player Matt Drury. By the time Dodgers reliever Conner Greene recorded the final out in the bottom of the ninth, both teams were more than ready to close the books on this one and head for the airport.

Quick Turnaround before homestand begins on Monday

After catching the redeye back to Southern California, the Dodgers open up a homestand on Monday night with a three-game set with the scuffling Pittsburgh Pirates. The Mets, on the other hand, have twenty-four hours to get their act together because we need them to do some damage to the Giants up in San Francisco before we see them again at the Ravine on the weekend. For the next three days anyway, let’s go Mets!